While not yet official, all signs point towards Marvel’s unannounced May 2016 film being a third Captain America solo feature. While the date and title aren’t yet known, its writers and directors are. Anthony and Joe Russo, of Arrested Development and Community fame, make their blockbuster debut with Captain America: The Winter Soldier this week and the film has earned the brothers another job with Marvel Studios.

The Russos are currently breaking the story for Captain America 3 and will be returning the helm the followup to The Winter Soldier, a sequel that’s already earning rave reviews as one of the studio’s best pictures to date. Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige has enough confidence in the project, that he’s already working with the Russos to develop another outing, somewhat of a rarity considering the other Marvel solo character film directors haven’t and/or likely won’t be returning for followups.

Following up on our epic on-set interview with the Russos, Don Kaye spoke with the directors on behalf of Screen Rant at the Captain America 2 junket and discussed how they landed the gig in the first place, returning for Captain America 3, building off of the events of The Avengers: Age of Ultron and working with the legendary Robert Redford.

The Russo Brothers

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Congratulations on this film, it’s a tremendous achievement. When you first started talking with Marvel and they said “’70s political thriller mixed with superhero film,” what did you say back?

Joe Russo: We were ecstatic. I mean, we grew up with our dad, our big thing was watching the late show with him. He was a big film buff and his favorite movies were ‘70s thrillers – “Parallax View,” “Three Days of the Condor,” “French Connection”…we’ve seen “The French Connection” a million times. And we’re comic book geeks. I started collecting comics when I was 10 years old. One of the first books I ever bought was a Captain America/Falcon team-up, so this was like a 30-year dream come true for us. You know, the great thing about being a comic book geek and a film geek, where you’re working in two genres that you adore, is you just go, “Well, what do I want to see executed in this movie?” What are the things that, you know, if we had unlimited resources – which you kind of do at Marvel just because they’re so good at what they do – what do I want to put up on that screen, and that’s what’s in this movie.

Talk about the “audition” process that you had to go through to get the job.

Anthony Russo: Yeah, as you can imagine, it was very extensive because these movies are so special. It’s like, you know, they’re very careful who they entrust them do. So it was a few months where we took a series of meetings with Marvel, where we got more and more specific progressively about our vision for the movie. It really was a wonderful experience. I mean, we’d never gone through something that lasted that long, but the virtue of that was, like, we really got to figure the film out over the course of that. So by the time we did get the job, we knew exactly what the movie was, which was great.

But it was a great process because Marvel – the great thing about Marvel is that they want you to surprise them. They want you to show up with something that they weren’t expecting or weren’t thinking about, a direction they weren’t thinking about going in. That’s really what lights them up, because they’ve done such amazing work up to this point, they really need to keep pushing into new areas to keep things fresh for audiences and I think that’s one thing, hopefully, that we were able to do with this movie.

Now you guys are already signed up for “Cap 3.” Do you have an idea of what you want to do with that movie?

Joe: We just started breaking the story literally in the last like two weeks. It’s fascinating because you’re trying to get this one out the door and you’re already trying to figure out what the next one is. But also you want to wait and see how people react to this movie and what it is they like and don’t like about it, you know, and lean into that in the next one. So we eager to hear reactions to the film so it can help sort of inspire some ideas for the next one.

And do you have to wait and see things end up after Age of Ultron is over and where Joss leaves everybody?

Joe: Yeah, we know – we’ve all read the script. That’s the great thing about Kevin, he keeps everybody in the loop and, you know, it’s awesome because it’s unlike anything that’s ever been done in movies before. You have this great collection of writers and directors and you’re all sharing ideas and it’s a very fluid and organic process.

Robert Redford walks on your set – what goes through your minds?

Anthony: Your mind just explodes with joy, you know, that he’s standing there in the flesh. I mean, he’s as iconic as they come and just an amazing individual. He’s so professional and gracious and really inspiring to us. I mean, it was an amazing opportunity for us to spend some time with somebody who’s been so important to us, not only as an actor and filmmaker, but you know, also the fact that he started the Sundance Film Festival, which (as) two guys who came up in the ‘90s through the independent film scene, he created the entire road that we used to find our way from Cleveland into the movie business, so.

Excited to see the Russos develop another Captain America film for Marvel Studios or would you like to see them take on another character? Let us know in the comments!

Captain America: The Winter Soldier hits theaters April 4, 2014, Guardians of the Galaxy on August 1, 2014, The Avengers: Age of Ultron on May 1, 2015, Ant-Man on July 17, 2015, and unannounced films for May 6 2016, July 8 2016 and May 5 2017.

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EddieB 12 months ago

If they make the next one as good as this one was I will be very happy

I love how they want to take in what the fan base thinks and how they feel as inspirations for the next one. Marvel, I have not seen this film yet, but I intend to do so in 2 days time. However, I must say, from what I have seen and heard, you seem to have a couple of good, solid directors by your side. Treat them well.

You know, I think Cap-A. #3 would be a good place to bring Black Panther in as a guest-hero, much as Falcon was brought in in #2. Capo and BP were always friends in the Avengers comics back in the day….!

Its got to be weird. These actors have worked with these characters though other directors, Johnston, Favaeru, and Whedon – not lightweights to say the least, and now you pick up the threads from not just your franchise but a handful of others.

On your first major film. I imagine the experience of directing TV shows probably gives them a good skill set in this regard.

What was the deal with all the camera shake, even in scenes where they’re filming people taking the screen was moving all around the place.. if you took your eyes off the center of the film you could see it was shifting here there and everywhere.

If it had a weak spot it was the Zola scene. As a fan I liked it but for the casual viewer I don’t think it would have really added to the story and may have seemed odd.

I loved all of the phase one films but the phase two series has raised the bar across the board and continued to tie the universe together in a way that makes each film feel so much bigger.

The only let down anything Marvel is doing is the tv show Agents of Shield. I wish they would stop trying to polish that turd. I cannot imagine it is winning any new bums on seats for the movies. Maybe i’m wrong.

Saw Cap 2 over a week ago and the Russo bros have done a fantastic job. The film was on par with the Avengers and definitely the best of the phase 2 films. You know they always say “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” and in this case I could not agree more. Sure there are a few things they could maybe improve on but now they have that opportunity and Iook forward to seeing what comes next.

YES,YES,YES PLEASE RETURN TO DIRECT CAP 3,THE RUSSO BROTHERS YOU GUYS DID SO WELL WITH CAP 2 THAT I’M SPEECHLESS.CAP 2 THAT MOVIE WAS SPECTACULAR,FANTASTIC,AWESOME,MAGNIFICENT,ACTION-PACKED,AND DYNAMITE.EASILY MY SECOND FAVORITE MARVEL MOVIE AND THAT’S REAL.DEFINITELY COME BACK TO DIRECT CAP 3,HOW MUCH I LOVED CAP 2-THEWINTER SOLDIER,I KNOW THAT CAP 3 WILL BE JUST AS GREAT AS LONG AS YOU GUYS ARE AT THE FOREFRONT.CAP 2 WAS JUST REALLY GREAT,ALL THE ACTION SCENES WERE TOTALLY HOTTTT.FANTASTIC JOB WITH CAP 2,JUST WONDERFUL,OUTSTANDING.LOVE YOU GUYS.